I've been running six Defenders to great effect.

1. The thread is talking about under 80-90 not being effective.

2. I’ve mentioned the 7 ship mc30s explicitly in this thread or another thread. Explicitly.

3. One should not equate the words overpowered or wins a lot to mean wins all the time. This is a key fallacy. Green knight is the only one who mentions that high squad shows don’t win every single darn regionals. ITs moving the goalposts.

We shall see how the new upgrades work out. It’s very telling though that ffg nerfed rieekan 3 different ways and rhymer. And now is releasing a wave of 3-4 different ways to combat squadrons without relying on a large point value of your own squadrons. And nearly no upgrades useful to max squad lists.

2 hours ago, TheBigLev said:

Since Valen isn't heavy, only Grit squads can escape

Just as a note: Grit only allows you to escape if you are engaged with a single squadron. If you are engaged with a 'heavy' squadron and a regular squadron, you still cannot move.

5 minutes ago, Astrodar said:

Just as a note: Grit only allows you to escape if you are engaged with a single squadron. If you are engaged with a 'heavy' squadron and a regular squadron, you still cannot move.

Oh that's cool. I should have known that, not sure why I forgot. I even recommend Valen with shuttles...

41 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

1. The thread is talking about under 80-90 not being effective.

2. I’ve mentioned the 7 ship mc30s explicitly in this thread or another thread. Explicitly.

3. One should not equate the words overpowered or wins a lot to mean wins all the time. This is a key fallacy. Green knight is the only one who mentions that high squad shows don’t win every single darn regionals. ITs moving the goalposts.

I'm curious what your definition of "being effective" is? What's your end goal?

Do you expect a smaller force to win vs a larger one? At what points ratio would you expect that to happen? How do you prevent the mechanism for smaller points squads from being abused in larger points value units?

Do you expect a smaller force to die, but kill at least its own points value on the opposing side? 2/3 its points value? 1/2?

Do you expect a smaller force to die but enable the (relatively greater points value of) ships in the fleet to win more? What ratio would you expect that to be a reasonable outcome? 30 vs 130? 50 vs 100? 60 vs 75?

To me it's clear that in the discussion people have very different definitions of what's "effective", so understanding the definitions of what's being discussed should help the conversation. Apologies if you've explained your definitions in another thread.

12 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

1. The thread is talking about under 80-90 not being effective.

What does effective mean in this context? Are you looking to destroy, stall, or degrade? I think it's reasonable to ask interceptors to destroy a slightly larger mixed force about half the time, but only delay forces that seriously outnumber them. I can maybe see design room for a dedicated anti-squadron ship, but I don't think it's easy.

10 Tie fighter squadrons are only 80 points. "Light" squadron cost, keep some in reserve and send in wave after wave of your own men until the Killbots reach their limit and shut down.

21 minutes ago, Maturin said:

I'm curious what your definition of "being effective" is? What's your end goal?

Do you expect a smaller force to win vs a larger one? At what points ratio would you expect that to happen? How do you prevent the mechanism for smaller points squads from being abused in larger points value units?

Do you expect a smaller force to die, but kill at least its own points value on the opposing side? 2/3 its points value? 1/2?

Do you expect a smaller force to die but enable the (relatively greater points value of) ships in the fleet to win more? What ratio would you expect that to be a reasonable outcome? 30 vs 130? 50 vs 100? 60 vs 75?

To me it's clear that in the discussion people have very different definitions of what's "effective", so understanding the definitions of what's being discussed should help the conversation. Apologies if you've explained your definitions in another thread.

One of the issues with mass squadron play is that its very easy to not lose, or not lose hard. Its difficult to lose a majority of your points in squadrons to non-mass squad lists.

The three criteria then of effective small screen usage is thus:
1. Be small enough to allow for points to be taken in other places for varying playstyle. (Currently, this means 90+ points, 6 tie D is 96. That's already 1/4 of your list simply dedicated to not dying to one type of list, with very little efficacy to anything else: 6 tie Ds average 6 x .75 = 4 damage per turn for 96 points.)
2. Either stall or be able to kill off enough squads to avoid allowing a bomber or multirole fleet have free reign to score SIGNIFICANT points by killing ships outright in quick speed or by amassing huge 100+ point advantages off of the 3 fighter objectives. Usually this means lasting exactly longer than 2 turns, any value of 1-2 is usually not enough. (ESPECIALLY ON SMALLER SHIPS, CAPABLE OF KILLING THEM WITHIN A FEW ATTACKS, SEE RAIDER, SEE CR90).
3. Not be utterly lost in points because of having to go up against a larger mass of squadrons, and stalling enough for an anti-ship based ship fleet to score a similar amount of points by attacking ships ( because look again: you can't usually kill squadrons reliably with flak if your screen is dead.) This is the key. Typically what happens is the whole light screen dies, 90 points lost, one or two max fighter squads die, about 30 points or so. Its a free 60 points for max suqad player. Plus ships they kill, and then SOMETIMES you can kill their ships, but usually not all or enough to override the 60 points lost to squadrons and about 100 points won on objective points. Always remember: the assumption here is fair: both sides killed some ships.

I expect there to be an way to deal with squadron lists beyond simply taking a near similar ratio of squadrons. I should not have to deal with 134 with multipliers only by taking near 90-100 points in squadrons. Thats a 3.5:5 ratio of squadrons.

-----

I'm going to say this over and over, because people want to put the words in my mouth I never said: MASS SQUADRON LISTS ARE BEATABLE . ISD + 4 goz and 134 squadrons is a good counter. But its the SAME **** ARCHETYPE, MAYBE EVEN WORSE. If your argument to me is, "Blail, mass squadron lists are beatable", please just stop. I never said the opposite to that. Its about beating it with something OTHER than a 3.5:5 ratio. I am very specific. I am not generalized and do not make distinguishments. My statement hasn't changed in over a year.
(Yes a ISD + 4, with 100 points of rogue squads is a great counter. But its part of the problem, not the solution.)

I also never said 33 points of Tycho and Shara should hold of 134 points of squadrons. NO. I said 70-90 points and 6 squadrons though, should at least offer a chance to MAKE LISTS THAT AREN'T SQUADRON CENTRIC. STOP PUTTING WORDS IN MY MOUTH (I HOPE YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE.)

Note, I respond to questions directly when asked. Opposite opinions have NOT done so. And have tried to dismiss my claims with blanket statements of ridicule, or "not the game I see". You can accuse me of many things, but - not responding, changing goalposts, ignoring counter-comments - those aren't there.

As I said upthread I primarily play 60-80 points of squadrons with plenty of success against full squad players. I generally feel confident in my ability to meet all three of your criteria.

1. 60-80 points easily gives me enough to have another effective combat ship more than the heavy squad/carrier player. Sometimes it’s an extra ship, sometimes I have a small gunship while they have a flotilla.
2. I can reliably kill at least the equivalent points in squadrons and earn my points back. Not every time, but with high enough frequency that I don’t feel the need to re think my basic tactics.
3. My squads do get killed off sometimes, but they are never thrown away without specific purpose.

Now, this works for me and my fleets. I tend to play lots of long range ships in my fleets which colors how I use my squadrons.

When I am significantly outnumbered in the squadron game (and even when not), I play my squadrons to counter attack. This generally means letting my ships get attacked by bombers. Then I can counter attack a part of the enemy squads and hopefully kill it. The key for me is making sure that the squadron fight happens in range of my flak. My mid sized squad force plus flak can usually get things going well for me.

Does it always work, no. But it works more often than not and well enough that I can take 60-80 points in squads to a tournament and not feel like I’m gonna get rolled. I looked at all the fleets in my fleet builder and they all fall in that range. My record against 120+ squad builds is well above .500 playing in the 60-80 range.

I am excited about EWS to no end as it will only help this strategy while still being a really good upgrade against ships too.

So yeah, it is more than possible to spend 60-80 points on squads and come out ahead. I generally disagree with your premise that playing with that level of squadrons is ineffective based on my own games and those I have observed.

I've been running tiny squad blobs fairly successfully. I took a whopping 2 TIEs to regionals and did alright.

Biggest thing I've learned about fighting uphill in the squadron game: If you get the opportunity, put the station WAY off in the corner and deploy on the other side of the board. It will only hurt you.

2 minutes ago, duck_bird said:

I've been running tiny squad blobs fairly successfully. I took a whopping 2 TIEs to regionals and did alright.

Biggest thing I've learned about fighting uphill in the squadron game: If you get the opportunity, put the station WAY off in the corner and deploy on the other side of the board. It will only hurt you.

That is solid advice

AA

I tend to do what Schmitty does. If you're playing light or you're playing defensively, it is usually because you have a ship or two that can tank some squadron shots. If they are extremely invested in the squadron game, think 2+3 Yavaris/GH, then they also do not have an Admonition floating around. Even the 1+4 ISD is not decked out in quite the same way it could be, which makes your ship positioning much easier. That means you can afford to tank at least a few squadron shots. I've been doing this in my Madine Liberty list for a long time. I've built Imperial equivalents that have performed well enough. You have to think of it in terms of "How do I pull enemy stands off the table?" Every stand you pull off the table significantly weakens the capacity of that squadron force to damage, even if it is a minor squad.

@Blail Blerg I don't really understand the "why" part of your premise that at Max squadron lists dominating is bad. This is Star Wars, squadrons are a huge part of every battle in the movies?

Aside from that, your argument, that a 60-90 Squadron is automatically going to be steamrolled in less than 2 turns by a Max Squadron, assumes that both players are utilizing them the same way. Standoff positioning and speed are huge for keeping an outnumbered Squadron force disrupting for long periods. You spread out your pin down outside Intel range, with as few Squadrons as needed, then repeat. If my opponent has that big a Squadron advantage, I expect to lose Most of my Squadrons, but kill more than I loose in ships. The only two max Squadron lists that make that very difficult are ISD+4 and Super Pickle+4, but that is the nature of a super resilient single point source. Even then, I still have pulled it off.

I honestly don't see a lack of Medium Squadron lists in my local meta, but I don't get out as much as I would like.

What I do run into, is the attitude that max Squadron lists are annoying. (Really the argument is never "They are OP." but always that they are "Annoying".)

Honestly though the best way to get the most out of a middle value Squadron list, is to make use of the double blue AA ships like the Neb B Escort and the GSD II. They actually are a force multiplier. (The more squadrons you bring into Medium range, the more squadrons I get to drop 2 AA dice on. That coupled with some smart positioning will even up the squadron game a bit.

Sothe simple answer is probably, If you want 70-90 points of squadrons to be effective against 134 points, you need to dedicate 44-64 points of ship to even up the fight. The failure to do so could be construed as poor commanding, and the inability to do so as poor planning.

It may be that you are seeing a problem I am not. Please elaborate if that is the case.

28 minutes ago, Tirion said:

AA

Favorite post of this thread. Just say'n....

24 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

One of the issues with mass squadron play is that its very easy to not lose, or not lose hard. Its difficult to lose a majority of your points in squadrons to non-mass squad lists.

The three criteria then of effective small screen usage is thus:
1. Be small enough to allow for points to be taken in other places for varying playstyle. (Currently, this means 90+ points, 6 tie D is 96. That's already 1/4 of your list simply dedicated to not dying to one type of list, with very little efficacy to anything else: 6 tie Ds average 6 x .75 = 4 damage per turn for 96 points.)
2. Either stall or be able to kill off enough squads to avoid allowing a bomber or multirole fleet have free reign to score SIGNIFICANT points by killing ships outright in quick speed or by amassing huge 100+ point advantages off of the 3 fighter objectives. Usually this means lasting exactly longer than 2 turns, any value of 1-2 is usually not enough. (ESPECIALLY ON SMALLER SHIPS, CAPABLE OF KILLING THEM WITHIN A FEW ATTACKS, SEE RAIDER, SEE CR90).
3. Not be utterly lost in points because of having to go up against a larger mass of squadrons, and stalling enough for an anti-ship based ship fleet to score a similar amount of points by attacking ships ( because look again: you can't usually kill squadrons reliably with flak if your screen is dead.) This is the key. Typically what happens is the whole light screen dies, 90 points lost, one or two max fighter squads die, about 30 points or so. Its a free 60 points for max suqad player. Plus ships they kill, and then SOMETIMES you can kill their ships, but usually not all or enough to override the 60 points lost to squadrons and about 100 points won on objective points. Always remember: the assumption here is fair: both sides killed some ships.

I expect there to be an way to deal with squadron lists beyond simply taking a near similar ratio of squadrons. I should not have to deal with 134 with multipliers only by taking near 90-100 points in squadrons. Thats a 3.5:5 ratio of squadrons.

OK, so in your example, the moderate squad player is inflicting only 33% of their value against a max squad list. I think expecting to inflict 100% damage is too much to ask, but there's a big gap between 33 & 100%.

I'd want a relationship much closer to inflicting (squad ratio)*squad value on the other side, but squad buff upgrades should be added into that ratio. (So 75 pts of fighters unsupported vs 100+50 of fighter & upgrades would inflict about 50% of it's value (38) while 75 vs 100+0 would inflict about 75% (55-ish) of it's value in losses.)

44 minutes ago, cynanbloodbane said:

@Blail Blerg I don't really understand the "why" part of your premise that at Max squadron lists dominating is bad. This is Star Wars, squadrons are a huge part of every battle in the movies?

Aside from that, your argument, that a 60-90 Squadron is automatically going to be steamrolled in less than 2 turns by a Max Squadron, assumes that both players are utilizing them the same way. Standoff positioning and speed are huge for keeping an outnumbered Squadron force disrupting for long periods. You spread out your pin down outside Intel range, with as few Squadrons as needed, then repeat. If my opponent has that big a Squadron advantage, I expect to lose Most of my Squadrons, but kill more than I loose in ships. The only two max Squadron lists that make that very difficult are ISD+4 and Super Pickle+4, but that is the nature of a super resilient single point source. Even then, I still have pulled it off.

I honestly don't see a lack of Medium Squadron lists in my local meta, but I don't get out as much as I would like.

What I do run into, is the attitude that max Squadron lists are annoying. (Really the argument is never "They are OP." but always that they are "Annoying".)

Honestly though the best way to get the most out of a middle value Squadron list, is to make use of the double blue AA ships like the Neb B Escort and the GSD II. They actually are a force multiplier. (The more squadrons you bring into Medium range, the more squadrons I get to drop 2 AA dice on. That coupled with some smart positioning will even up the squadron game a bit.

Sothe simple answer is probably, If you want 70-90 points of squadrons to be effective against 134 points, you need to dedicate 44-64 points of ship to even up the fight. The failure to do so could be construed as poor commanding, and the inability to do so as poor planning.

It may be that you are seeing a problem I am not. Please elaborate if that is the case.

Err. Does someone else want to explain this one? Why can't I use the dice printed on my ships???

I'll just say that there was a REAL thread saying that ISD's literally literally had no guns, and should not be able to do damage to anything. Some people dug up some OT clips of ISDs firing to show that they in fact did fire. This was a real thread. Do we need to go through that again?

Thanks for the ask. This is right. Usually though, its more valuable to invest into squadrons when you have a lot. Though, a GSD2 here or there helps. But as you note, they're not prevalent in real-life regional winning data. For what reason I'm not sure yet... I find them hard to justify too.
I have a much harder time justifying Flechette Torps... Its not their cost. Its the problem of opportunity cost. I find that that Demo gets a huge nerf in usefulness vs ships. If the GSD had 2 torps slots I think this whole thread and argument wouldn't exist.... ( wait. That's it! Just give Gladiators 2 torpedo slots! )

27 minutes ago, Baltanok said:

OK, so in your example, the moderate squad player is inflicting only 33% of their value against a max squad list. I think expecting to inflict 100% damage is too much to ask, but there's a big gap between 33 & 100%.

I'd want a relationship much closer to inflicting (squad ratio)*squad value on the other side, but squad buff upgrades should be added into that ratio. (So 75 pts of fighters unsupported vs 100+50 of fighter & upgrades would inflict about 50% of it's value (38) while 75 vs 100+0 would inflict about 75% (55-ish) of it's value in losses.)

So, then it comes back to the OP, what kind of upgrades are good at multiplying a small or medium force, but not a large force? Even though it seems you should limit it to a few squads, that doesn't help: People use Yavaris for max fleets' dn they don't win with Yavaris and a smaller force generally. Flight Controllers is a possible choice.

It would be interesting to know what people's actual real-life data is against max squads. I wonder if they find the same conclusion as the gaming group I was in fighting vs max squads. We tended to only get about 30 points killed, for 90 points sacrificed. And then lose a BUNCH of ships, and on top of that having the max squad player earn nearly 100+ points in objective gains. Easily a 150+ MOV difference each game. (This was pre-nerf Rieekan 2+3)

Data that would be lovely (and very hard to get):
How long did a light screen under 90pts survive for (in rounds)?
How many squadrons did a max squads lose vs light screen?
What was the ratio of points returned on a small screen?
How much more did ship points did a light screen, anti-ship ship based fleet score vs a max squad?
How many points in objectives (usually form the 3 fighter objective scoring ones or Most Wanted) did each side get?
Is there a huge disparity of these data points, is there a huge disparity on MOV gain for max squads vs other types of lists?

There is the argument that Yavaris completely should be added to the squad value. But then, on the flip side, your opponent's points in ships, should be compensating comparatively in effective, destroying firepower. This is not the case. Generally, we find that the max squads player destroys more things and a ship player cannot get ships on target without running through a ball of squadrons, possibly losing ships in the process. Also, certain ships are much better only vs certain things. (Small ships cannot weather a full bombing run for instance). Multirole fighters literally don't care what target they're pointed at. Large, small, fighters, flotillas. All the same.

The why:

Squadron play is hard to learn how to do right.

I think this the big divide. There are a lot of players who aren’t bad but can’t/won’t wrap their heads around the squadron game which is a pivotal part of Armada and they are frustrated at the lack of personal progress.

Now, this community is primarily men and, I suspect, particularly inadept at assessing their feelings and communicating them. Their personal frustration at being less competitive at a game is manifested in feeling that the game is unfair or unbalanced in favor of those that have grasped the squadron game.

I don’t say this to demean other players - I myself am terrible at squadrons and that places a hard cap on how much success I can have playing this game. This results in a list building style that emphasizes mitigating squadron play... but mitigating a weakness will never fully compensate for a lack of competitiveness.

15 minutes ago, TaeSWXW said:

The why:

Squadron play is hard to learn how to do right.

I think this the big divide. There are a lot of players who aren’t bad but can’t/won’t wrap their heads around the squadron game which is a pivotal part of Armada and they are frustrated at the lack of personal progress.

Now, this community is primarily men and, I suspect, particularly inadept at assessing their feelings and communicating them. Their personal frustration at being less competitive at a game is manifested in feeling that the game is unfair or unbalanced in favor of those that have grasped the squadron game.

I don’t say this to demean other players - I myself am terrible at squadrons and that places a hard cap on how much success I can have playing this game. This results in a list building style that emphasizes mitigating squadron play... but mitigating a weakness will never fully compensate for a lack of competitiveness.

Very well said!

Thanks for the detailed replies Blail. I have a few observations:

2 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

3. Not be utterly lost in points because of having to go up against a larger mass of squadrons, and stalling enough for an anti-ship based ship fleet to score a similar amount of points by attacking ships ( because look again: you can't usually kill squadrons reliably with flak if your screen is dead.) This is the key. Typically what happens is the whole light screen dies, 90 points lost, one or two max fighter squads die, about 30 points or so. Its a free 60 points for max squad player. Plus ships they kill, and then SOMETIMES you can kill their ships, but usually not all or enough to override the 60 points lost to squadrons and about 100 points won on objective points. Always remember: the assumption here is fair: both sides killed some ships.

Well, the assumption isn't quite fair - you just stated the assumption is that the non-max squadron list is not killing enough to "override the 60 points lost to squadrons and about 100 points won on objective points". If this is your starting assumption, then it is no wonder that this follows:

2 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

I'm going to say this over and over, because people want to put the words in my mouth I never said: MASS SQUADRON LISTS ARE BEATABLE . ISD + 4 goz and 134 squadrons is a good counter. But its the SAME **** ARCHETYPE, MAYBE EVEN WORSE. If your argument to me is, "Blail, mass squadron lists are beatable", please just stop. I never said the opposite to that. Its about beating it with something OTHER than a 3.5:5 ratio. I am very specific.
(Yes a ISD + 4, with 100 points of rogue squads is a great counter. But its part of the problem, not the solution.)

I also never said 33 points of Tycho and Shara should hold of 134 points of squadrons. NO. I said 70-90 points and 6 squadrons though, should at least offer a chance to MAKE LISTS THAT AREN'T SQUADRON CENTRIC.

If I may paraphrase, you've just stated that Mass Squadron lists are only consistently beatable by other mass squadron lists. Of course, that is the logical conclusion if you start from the assumption that a sub-mass squadron list cannot make its points back by killing ships.

But is that true? The questions you ask are exactly what is needed to determine this. But as you point out, it's difficult data to collect and analyse. So we must make do with anecdotes and personal experiences.

32 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

It would be interesting to know what people's actual real-life data is against max squads. I wonder if they find the same conclusion as the gaming group I was in fighting vs max squads. We tended to only get about 30 points killed, for 90 points sacrificed. And then lose a BUNCH of ships, and on top of that having the max squad player earn nearly 100+ points in objective gains. Easily a 150+ MOV difference each game. (This was pre-nerf Rieekan 2+3)

Are you basing your experiences and assumptions on playing against 1 list archetype? I can see how that would be frustrating...but it's hardly a good place to start from when making general statements about squadrons in today's environment. As others have said, their experiences differ from yours. Perhaps it's a result of the meta shifting? Difficult to say, of course.

So...why not look at your assumption that 320-400 points worth of ships cannot approach and kill 266 points worth of ships quickly enough to weather the bombing. Are there ships that can move quickly enough, or weather enough damage (given the right upgrades) to be effective? You mentioned MC30's.....what about other ships?

There's another assumption I hear - that the fighters are scoring 100+ points on objectives. Is first player always taken in your area? Making them play YOUR objectives can easily gain you the extra 50-100 points on missions, for the low low price of going second.

I don't play enough Armada regularly to have a magic solution for you. But I hope there's some food for thought here.

1 hour ago, Blail Blerg said:

Err. Does someone else want to explain this one? Why can't I use the dice printed on my ships???

I'll just say that there was a REAL thread saying that ISD's literally literally had no guns, and should not be able to do damage to anything. Some people dug up some OT clips of ISDs firing to show that they in fact did fire. This was a real thread. Do we need to go through that again?

Snarky, but also amusingly delivered and with a lovely historical note about early Armada. Well played Sir. Honestly not offended, I threw in the reference to the movies because so many of the early squadron arguments. Used the "It doesn't feel like Star Wars" argument when too few squadrons were used.

But honestly I was seriously asking Why is it bad for the game that squadron heavy lists are easier to win with. You are allowed up to 1/3 of your total fleet points as for squadrons. From my point of view, this is the ship to squadron breakdown that was intended by the designers. This implies two things to me.

1. Squadrons were intended to be more potent weapons in this game than ships, they just need ships. (Otherwise the game wouldn't have such a low limit.... Ok time plays a factor there as well, but not completely.)

2. It may be that it was at this, 1/3 level, that squadrons were intended to be played. (That this was where a fleet was most balanced to be competitive. Anything less, while still an option, was not optimal. Credit to FFG's designers, if this was the intent, they walked the line nicely, and other less optimal lists still have a competitive chance.

Squadron heavy lists are easier to win with, No Squadron lists are completely valid, but require a bit more skill and planning. So it stands to reason, (at least to me,) that trying to take a middle road, that trys to incorporate the tactics of both, will be more difficult.

I really wasn't trying to ask an obtuse question, but rather understand why you find it a problem. Insert "your own point of view".

I am also not against a force multiplier for mid points squadron forces. I'm just not sure how you implement it in a way that doesn't benefit aces over generics even more than they already are, unless it is a buff to a ship's AA fire or a GH type of obstruction, when friendly generic squadrons are outnumbered 2 to 1 by enemy squadrons.

1 hour ago, Maturin said:

If I may paraphrase, you've just stated that Mass Squadron lists are only consistently beatable by other mass squadron lists. Of course, that is the logical conclusion if you start from the assumption that a sub-mass squadron list cannot make its points back by killing ships.

Hmm. I didn't phrase this well enough. I've mentioned that 7 ship MC30 is known to be workable against mass squadron. I've said this a few times already in this thread, and a few times in many other threads. Wave 5 regionals had a GSD spam list that did well with no squads also. Other than that, I can think of literally no other examples. Giled's 2 ISD lists are notably difficult to use against mass squadrons.

1 hour ago, Maturin said:

So...why not look at your assumption that 320-400 points worth of ships cannot approach and kill 266 points worth of ships quickly enough to weather the bombing. Are there ships that can move quickly enough, or weather enough damage (given the right upgrades) to be effective? You mentioned MC30's.....what about other ships?

At this point I have about 25 games of testing vs the Rieekan 2+3. Combined with everyone else in the area that has also tried, we may have nearly 100 games between us against this archetype alone. At what point does enough people and enough games become data points and not anecdotes? Is 100 not enough for you?

Frankly, there ARE options, such as an ISD, which I already pointed out up thread. Mc30s. Demolisher 1st 2nd seems some use. But generally when you ask fast, you just answered your own question: requires going first.

as for tanky, what if I told you that every single small ship except the MC30 dies to max squadrons within 1 turn. In fact, it usually takes only about 4 Bwing attacks (or less with Norra and BCC and good luck) to kill a Raider? That's literally HALF of just Yavaris, let alone the other 7 seven squadrons that haven't even attacked but canbe set up so that if you attempt to rush the carrier, you'll land right in the middle of the blob? The MC30 survives with only hull left, I think usually with 2 hull left. A MC80 and an ISD both go down within 1.5 turns. Doable within 2 turns by alpha striking a few squadrons, Inteling the rest of the screen, and bombing the crud out of it. I've literally tested this out with dice, and have done it on the table. This isn't an opinion: you can replicate the result by yourself.

1 hour ago, Maturin said:

There's another assumption I hear - that the fighters are scoring 100+ points on objectives. Is first player always taken in your area? Making them play YOUR objectives can easily gain you the extra 50-100 points on missions, for the low low price of going second.

Actually, this is one of the biggest parts of my plan, and generally why you see my lists always bid, even when going 2nd. Have you seen my fleet list name things? VVVZZ Motti - s6 b8 - Go 2nd? See the bid 8? Even then, a majority of objectives favor max squads (more rocks favor squads, and deny rushing carriers), and if youre a light screen and they're a max squad, they can usually out Strategic you on tokens also. Its very tricky to find objectives that can survive mass squad AND be good vs the rest of the field.

Also, always recall that currently Rieekan is still the top choice: You bum rush Yavaris? It gets to 6 Bwing attack you before it gets removed, regardless.

Of course,the trick is to time it right: Again, I'm not saying its unbeatable. But this is a tactic. Guess what: The squadron player can counter play: They don't let you time it right, or make it not matter, by weathering your squadron offensive, responding by killing it outright/or intel-ing it. And then continuing on their merry way bombing you to death.

2 hours ago, TaeSWXW said:

The why:

Squadron play is hard to learn how to do right.

I think this the big divide. There are a lot of players who aren’t bad but can’t/won’t wrap their heads around the squadron game which is a pivotal part of Armada and they are frustrated at the lack of personal progress.

Now, this community is primarily men and, I suspect, particularly inadept at assessing their feelings and communicating them. Their personal frustration at being less competitive at a game is manifested in feeling that the game is unfair or unbalanced in favor of those that have grasped the squadron game.

I don’t say this to demean other players - I myself am terrible at squadrons and that places a hard cap on how much success I can have playing this game. This results in a list building style that emphasizes mitigating squadron play... but mitigating a weakness will never fully compensate for a lack of competitiveness.

Thank you Geek19 and Snipafist for liking that post.

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What exactly do you want to say to me Tae? Are you implying I should.... git gud?

I guess my 25-30 games vs Rieekan alone don't qualify for trying to learn the squadron game. Nor do my 15 or so games of playing Rieekan myself count for learning to play with squadrons. I'm also really bad playing squadrons because I haven't been playing them over and over for the whole of last year. Is that what you mean? Playing against the Regional winner of this region doesn't qualify. Okay.

Maybe I called the mirror match and top5/8 of worlds and at least 3 different regionals 6 months ahead of time because... I'm a scrub? (Oh wait I am a scrub. I don't own 4 MC30s for beating people in the face with).

Really, tell me, what do you mean? I guess I haven't lived up to your standards. Have I failed because I didn't try hard enough? If you give me another year I swear I'll grind out another 25 games of anti-mass squadron. I promise. I'm a good student. Don't green lightsaber slice me in half in my sleep.

Some cool data for you all. Of the 10 Wave6 REgionals we have data for in the winners (since I can't find the aggregates for top4 or top25%):

92

122

33

129

133

133

129

134

134

134

Squadron points used.

Notice something I said about light screens under 90?

Typically, also, 120+ is grouped into 120-134.

If you do that:

1 winner with under 50 points.

0 winners between 50-90

1 winner between 91-120

8 winners (80%) between 121-134.

Source: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NR5jNoKNtDX9qHrMHIpDdFl8OzGSOEi_ELJ5ylvu4u4/edit#gid=1264875276

If you want to say stuff about sample size, don't heard it before: If you want to see Top25, get it yourself. Its right there. Go ahead.

Here's top 4 break down.

Top 8 breakdown.

Note the trend going from top1 to top4 to top8: Winners with 121-134:
top1 = 80%
top4 = 45.9%
top8 = 36.6%

See a trend?

Note the All usage of 121-134, compared to top8 top4 top1.

Here's Wave 5, a lot larger data collection: